Illustration Workation in New York - Part 4 - Extras

Alright! So after the library we also popped by the Grand Central Station. It was very cool, but very very busy.

And then we dashed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We only had about two hours to be there before closing so we didn't get to see everything, and the things we saw we didn't get a chance to appreciate as much as should. But here are some pictures anyhow:

Ceiling in the Greece section

That's just me

The Boxer

Some wonderful Greek ceramics

These were funny to upload to Facebook when it kept asking me to tag the faces

Egyptian wall

And a sucky cell picture of the fantastic armor and weaponry section

We saw phenomenal variety of famous paintings too, but there was no time to take pictures of all of them, and they're better documented somewhere else online anyhow.

On the last day (Saturday June 29th) we went to the Guggenheim but there were no photos allowed indoors so that's my only picture of it below:

I've got to say though - that the main portion of the James Turrell light show was wonderful - very meditative. Here's a lovely photo I've found on the internet of it...well part of it. The colour of the light changed slowly but constantly, and there were several light illusions located around the spiraling halls of the Guggenheim.

ames Turrell, Rendering for Aten Reign, 2013. Daylight and LED light. Site-specific installation, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York © James Turrell. Rendering: Andreas Tjeldflaat, 2012 © Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation.

That's right - NO STOPPING! Go go go!

The end!

Postcard Parade!

Hi!

Fine, maybe not "parade" per se, but there will be a festival and there will be postcards for purchase.

Next week, starting on Thursday August 1st the Yellow Crane Festival of Art & Design will be rolling out tables on Granville Island, Vancouver for their annual summer celebration of Emily Carr University of Art + Design’s diverse and talented students and alumni!

The festival is free to attend and it will be on 11am to 4pm daily, from August 1st to the 4th.
I'll be there with some friends, representing the Rain City Illustration Club of the university and selling cards, illustration prints, screen prints, original artwork, calendars, and even skateboard decks (I think). It should be a really great atmosphere with live music, prize raffles, laughter, art, and ice-cream all around. So to everyone in Vancouver - please stop by to at least have a look! =)

What I'm contributing are some prints and postcards that I've recently had printed. I'll have 5 of each of these up for grabs - all nicely packaged in crystal clear bags with a cardboard backing:

Vanishing Canids - 4.75 x 12"

Hummerfly - 6.5 x 10" (I think)

The postcards I've ordered from Moo.com and they turned out wonderful and they arrived much quicker than the estimated date, only about a week after I ordered them actually. I'm always worried about colour and contrast accuracy when I order anything, but there was nothing to fear as these came out pretty close to precisely what I saw on my screen. Yay Moo! I'm not getting promote them, I'm just delighted when I get what I ask for. Anyhow, here are the cards:

Some older images, some new, and definitely one with blue.

All the postcards together

Reverse side

Just a few more photos of the cards, for fun.

Well, there you have it. Once again - come on down to the Yellow Crane Festival, maybe get some of my cards and have a fantastic B.C. long weekend. You know, if you get some, you can send them to a friend or a family member, or frame them as a mini print, or lock them away in secret drawer or whatever. Just saying ;)
And if you want to order some of your own postcards, follow {this link} to get 10% off your first order. (I swear on my cat I'm not getting paid to say this).

Happy Thursday!

Illustration Workation in New York - Part 3 - Extras

Happy Tuesday!

Today I'll just be throwing on some photos and random stories that happened during our trip.

Let's start with the New York subway system.
First of all - it's huge! So many different lines, stations, transfers, and travel options. This makes transit in this city quite fast, but possibly confusing at times. My favourite part was that transit was super cheap, compared to Vancouver. In New York one can buy a weekly unlimited rides metro pass card for $30 dollars. And the city is huge, and there was no 'zoning' as far as we were aware. To compare in Vancouver for $30 dollars you can ride unlimited for 3 days (through most of the Metro Vancouver area) if you get a day pass for each of those days. Don't get me started on this.
Anyway - lots of fun things can happen on the NY subway. There are people who sing and even break-dance when the train is moving. And my favourite part was seeing these ads inside:

"The Cheese Dunce's Brain cannot process the bold flavors and fine, natural ingredients of Finlandia cheese. Hence the title Cheese Dunce."

"The Cheese Masochist loves the pain of denying himself the natural ingredients of fine Finlandia Cheese."

My least favourite part of the NY subway experience was having a spider fall on my arm somewhere in the tunnels. It could have been worse. It could have fallen on my head.

Now for some pictures from the NY library:

I wonder what that cluster of green lights is...a ghost?

Wonderful exhibit on historic children's books

Alice in Wonderland

Participating in the interactive part of the exhibit

Part of a book arch

Maurice Sendak section

The Blue Fairy Book

Randolph Caldecott

What pop up books should aspire to

William Blake pages

"The Frog Princess" - a Russian folktale which is one my favourite books/stories from my childhood.

In the gift shop I found this little treasure - best pun ever!

Inside the library itself:

Look! It's the ghostly green lights again!

And here too. Ok, fine. They may have something to do with my camera metering the light fixtures, but it's more fun to think of them as apparitions, so shush.

There's me, pretending to read a book. though I did actually read some of them later, as you'll see in a sec.

Glancing around at the shelves I spotted some old bibliographical dictionaries. So I looked up my last name in some Polish books, where my fathers lineage supposedly stretches from.

possible relative?

And look! My very own name twin, with a different spelling though. I like how there's no death date there.

So, when I got home I Googled this Maria Olszewska and found this Wikipedia entry. Pretty neat. We may be related, or we may not, but still a neat find. Here's a couple of nice pictures of her from the web:

Wow, ok - this post is getting long with all these pictures. So I think I'll just keep stretching this adventure on and have a post again next week about the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, and something else that I'm forgetting right now.

Cheers!